The Prize Brute

The boxer, a good-natured brute of a dog, was bred in central Europe in the 15th Century to whip its weight in wild boars. In the U.S., until recently, boxers were as rare as giraffes. Even 16 years ago, says one breeder, "you could lead all the boxers in the country into Times Square, say 'scat,' and they'd have been out of sight in the flick of your finger." Now, still good-natured but also smartly fashionable, some 75,000 boxers (costing up to $5,000 per pup) are on leash in the 48 states.

The man who is most responsible for the boom in boxers is John P. Wagner, a Chicago utility financier and onetime Great Dane breeder. Thirteen years ago, Wagner took a $4,000 gamble by buying Dorian von Marienhof, the champion boxer of Germany. Then he talked 50 or so people (including Jack Dempsey and Sally Rand) into buying shares in his prize brute.

At Wagner's ten-acre Wisconsin kennel, Dorian von Marienhof did so well at begetting blue-blooded pups that three-quarters of the 24 boxers in the Special Champion Class last week, at the Westminster Kennel Club Show, had his blood in their veins. The best of them, in the opinion of the judges, was Wagner's pug-ugly Zazarac Brandy of Mazelaine, at 3 a veteran of 50 shows.

With the breed championship under his collar, Zazarac Brandy strutted again into the green-carpeted ring at Madison Square Garden for a go at 22 rivals for the best-in-group prize (boxers, Great Danes, collies, German shepherds, etc., classified as "working breeds"), and won again. It was easier than baiting boars. When the six group-finalists--a Welsh terrier, a Dalmatian, a miniature pinscher, an Irish setter, a greyhound and Zazarac Brandy--gathered for the showdown, it took tuxedoed Judge Tom Carruthers III just 15 minutes to single out Brandy as best-in-show--and dog-of-the-year.

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